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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27537784">Everybody's House is Haunted</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/t0talcha0s/pseuds/t0talcha0s'>t0talcha0s</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Hunter X Hunter</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Canon Compliant, Friendship, Gen, Ghosts and Not-Ghosts, Hauntings, Heaven's Arena, Pre-Canon, Those Two Years Killua Spent There As a Kid</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 16:27:47</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,500</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27537784</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/t0talcha0s/pseuds/t0talcha0s</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Where there is death, lots of it, there are ghosts. Whether that be a war zone, a boxing ring, or a home. There are ghosts and with Killua and with Heaven's Arena, there are ghosts.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Gon Freecs &amp; Killua Zoldyck</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>14</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Everybody's House is Haunted</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Rob Cantor Ghost x Mother Mother Ghosting</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Heaven’s Arena is haunted. With the number of bodies, the number of histories beaten into its stories it is no wonder. It is even a feature of walking ghost tours:  </p>
<p><em> Thousands of fighters have roamed these halls and thousands have died in them, and some of the dead ones still roam </em> </p>
<p>It isn’t so hokey, not actually, and It’s hard to tell in the daytime, when the halls are full and the arenas raucous with screaming cheers, but at night those same hallways stretch long and quiet under the hungry buzz of the fluorescent lights and all those fighters lie sleeping and dream strange dreams.</p>
<p>It is worse, the ghosts the history the dreams, if there is in those halls, among the hauntings, a legacy. Killua Zoldyck is six but the amount of Zoldycks that have slept among the white walls and golden windows of the arena is at least double that. </p>
<p>But Killua, right now, is six. His hair falls into his eyes and he still smiles at strangers. He can barely reach the countertop to sign his name on the paperwork for his first fight. </p>
<p>“What’s your name?” The cashier asks, curious and concerned. She’d seen children in these halls before but so young, and alone </p>
<p>“Killua Zoldyck” and she can’t know how to respond. </p>
<p>He kills his first opponent, and his second, and it isn’t until he is on the 150th floor that he realizes not every competitor kills. He’s watching a match with a big cup of juice and plenty of candy and one of the men falls, and his opponent lets him get back up again. He sips his juice through the straw until it makes the sound of empty suction against the plastic of the cup. In his dream that night, on the bed big enough to hold he and all his siblings, he kills the competitors from the day’s match and they get up again and twice and a third time and the ring is filled with the pinkness of innards and the cuts from too-sharp nails and his hands and up his arms and down his shoulders and across his back Killua turns red and red so red it’s black and it soaks down into his shoes and the men match his gaze and get back up. </p>
<p>Killua’s grandfather had once told him </p>
<p>“Killing is the most powerful act a person can commit but that does not mean it is beautiful”  and Killua’s father had once told him </p>
<p>“Killing is the most powerful act a person can commit and it is out of respect you learn to do it right” and  Killua’s brother had once told him </p>
<p>“Killing is the most powerful act a person can commit.” And there was nothing behind his eyes when he said it, flat black with the simplicity of the thought. </p>
<p>Among the fighters at Heaven’s Arena, like with sailors or soldiers or dancers, there are superstitions that come with the territory. Throw your first punch in each match with your non-dominant hand, only bring a weapon if you’ve had it for over a year, don’t pet the cats in the alleyways, never pray after a win. And each of them had their explanations: the first strike is the bravest and the most dangerous you don’t want to lose your best hand, you need to give your weapons time to trust you, they are the spirits of vengeful losses, don’t give g-d the credit for a win of your own. Killua didn’t know them, never bothered to learn, didn’t listen to the older competitors who wanted to teach. </p>
<p>There was an older woman, older as in thirty as in older then a six year old, who wanted to meet with Killua before their fight. </p>
<p>“I know you have a track record” she said “and I won’t be insulted to become a part of it. But don’t think, boy, that I would ever kill you.” </p>
<p>“But that’ll be boring, it won’t be interesting if you don’t fight.”</p>
<p>“I will fight, but you I will not kill.” </p>
<p>“If you’re not fighting to kill you’re not even fighting.” And as she lay beneath him on the mat, the red of her spilling against her skin, against the canvas, Killua’s only thought was how boring she was, how pathetic and cruel to just hand him his victory. </p>
<p>That night he lay his head on his pillow and dreamt of hair. The hair was long and was black and was not connected to any head he could see. Killua was caught in it, tangled around his biceps and twirled around his stomach and trapping his feet to the earth. It was everywhere and it was unbroken and it stretched to the sky like it was sent from the clouds. It wormed its way around his face and over his eyes and into his mouth and it was warm and comfortable and it was invasive and threatening and it wove between his fingers and tore into his throat and he couldn’t breathe and the hair, the grimy blackness and the soft touch and Killua burst awake more confused than afraid, a want and a fear and love and “love” and death. </p>
<p>There were some days Killua wandered the streets of the city. He’d recently bought a skateboard and he’d zip across the brick and the rumble against the wheels would bubble laughs up from his stomach and out of his throat and he’d ride around the city and laugh and it’d be joy and freedom and he would watch all the people strolling with their square bags from the shopping district and their brown paper bags from the bakeries and their purses all filled with coins and keys and makeup. They were a fascinating thing, the faces and bodies that swam by as he rolled. The wind brushed his hair out of his eyes and the city was so bright he’d laugh. And at the end of the day he’d return to the arena and the white and his room and he’d fight again and he’d kill. </p>
<p>In the hallway outside of Killua’s hotel room there is a figure at night. It is short and it is hunched and the round of its shoulders move like a soccer ball kicked clear across the field. It looks at him, as Killua goes to buy candy or to fight or to come back and wash the blood from the backs of his knees. It looks like an old man, like a martial artist, like a woman with pink hair and a pair of swords, it looks like a fighter, like fighter’s he’s fought, like a wind-up toy or the doorknob of a sibling’s bedroom. Killua looks at it but it doesn’t feel like he’s looking at it and he can’t tell what, from him, it wants. </p>
<p>The man across from him in the ring laughs. </p>
<p>“A fucking kid!” he says “and a scrawny one at that. You’re cute but don’t think I’ll go easy.” And soon he isn’t talking and he isn’t laughing and Killua blinks the blood out of his eye and as he does the face of the referee blurs and twists. </p>
<p>His father calls. </p>
<p>“You’ve been there a while, son.”</p>
<p>“It’s funny here, I haven’t reached the 200th floor yet.” Almost though, two more to go, and Killua has been postponing his matches for months, letting his date of disqualification run close. The flowers in the lobby never seem to wilt, year round they’re red and orange and firm. </p>
<p>Killua dreams of the ghosts of the people he’s killed. There’s hundreds of them and they press up against him like in a subway and Killua doesn’t feel guilty, not for a second. He just feels crowded, crowded and unknown. The next day he kills his opponent by tearing his leg off and it doesn’t feel good. He doesn’t do it again. He doesn’t feel guilty and he doesn’t think it's strong and he doesn’t think it’s pretty, all the blood and the pain and the cheering and he really doesn’t think much of it. </p>
<p>Heaven’s Arena doesn’t come with friends. There are hundreds of fighters and employees and fans and they all know Killua’s name but not much else. He isn’t upset about it per se, but he thinks about his home and all the butlers and the brothers and the people and he thinks it’d be nice and he thinks it might be even better than that too. </p>
<p>On his way out, on his last day after his last fight and his last kill where he forfeited the honor of the 200th floor but not as a statement Killua passes blurry little figures in the hallway. Dozens of them. Heaven’s Arena comes with ghosts. And in his last night in this bed he dreams about the sterile white corridors and the slate hallways of his home and the heat of a person beside him and the cold presence of the ghosts.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I don't have anything to say for this. HMU if you dug it.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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